Flicker of Hope
by KodokSangar
Summary: In April 1945, the Red Army managed to breach the German's defense and marched straight to Berlin. Realizing any further resistance is futile, a German Kampfgruppe retreated to the west in hope to surrender to the Western Allied Force. However, a strange phenomenon saved them and a young Waffen-SS officer found himself at home, for a quest of redemption. (Rating may change)


**DISCLAIMER : I OWN NOTHING! EXCEPT FOR MY OCS…**

* * *

CHAPTER 1: GOING HOME

 _"Izetta, do you believe in hope? Do you believe it exist…for our kinds?"_

 _"Of course, I believe it! Princess is my hope!"_

 _"Princess Finè, huh?"_

 _"What about you, Emil? What do you think of hope?"_

 _"What…I think…"_

* * *

"The Ivans are coming! Get to your positions!" The yell of the soldier outside waken up the young officer from his deep slumber.

The officer sat on the sofa where he slept whilst trying to shield his eyes from the sunrays outside the windows. He slowly brushed his messy white hair and wiping the tears on his red eyes. _"Finally, the next day of hell, huh?"_ He thought.

April 12th 1945, the soviets launched a large scale invasion in retaliation for the German's invasion of their Motherland. The tide of war had been turned against them. The once mighty army of Nazi Germany equipped with the most advanced war machines was no match against the overwhelming Soviet Red Army.

A small _Kampfgruppe_ consisted of Grenadiers, Panzergrenadiers, Pioneers, and Panzers was holding their position in a small town not far from Berlin. The group was just a rag tag of the surviving German troops from their respective divisions. Their job was to hold the Soviet as long as they can...with their severely outnumbered force.

The officer grabbed his Waffen-SS Panzer garb coat and peaked hat. He grabbed his sidearm and holstered it before walked to the outside. In the outside, soldiers from Wehrmacht, Waffen-SS, and even the Volkssturm were rushed around, handing each other weapons and setting up defensive position.

"Good morning, _Hauptsturmfuhrer_ ," a Wehrmacht officer said behind him. The young officer turned around and snapped into attention.

" _Herr_ _Oberstleutnant_!" He greeted him. The higher-ranked officer just smiled and tapped his shoulder before telling him to follow him.

"This is going to be our last stand against the soviet before they reach Berlin," he said. They witnessed as the soldiers ran to and fro around the town. "We must do everything we can to hold them as long as we can. So, the other may retreat to the west."

"Understood," The younger officer said. He took a deep-breathe before continue. "We maybe from different chain of command, but we must fight together till the end."

The older officer smiled before stared him on the eyes. He then stopped on his track and said. "To be honest, until this day...I think that all Waffen-SS are just bunch of retarded kids who fight for a dictator, but..." He said in low tone. "You proved me wrong _Hauptsturmführer_ Edelweiss...even in the darkest darkness, there will be always a flicker of light."

"Well sir...I'm just following what I believe," He said as he stared on the sky, now filled with Messerschmitt fighters and Stuka dive bombers. "When there's hope, anything can happen."

The officer chuckled as he patted his shoulder. "You're an interesting man…Let's hope we can get out from here alive so I can treat you beer."

"Yes, _Oberstleutnant_ Emmerich," the officer then left him and walked to relay order to his men.

"Well, I should've gone too," he said as he made his way to where his tank parked. It was the Panzerkampfwagen VI Ausf E, or infamously known as a Tiger I.

After noticing his presence, a younger soldier who was busy repairing the tank gave him a _Sieg Heil_ salute. "Herr Komandant!"

The officer just sighed a bit and nodded. "At ease, Lauri," he said without returning the salute.

"I've repaired the track sir, I'm sure it won't break anymore," the Finnish soldier, Lauri said, telling his commander about the situation. "Well, getting hit from a T-34...what a shame..."

"Let's get in, we don't have all day," the officer said as he climbed into the turret hatch, where his commander seat was.

"Understood," Lauri said, climbing and opening the driver hatch.

Once the commander inside the tank, he noticed the loader was sleeping and slapped his back. "Hey, hey, Heinrich, wake up!"

"Ugghh, I'm up!" Heinrich said as he quickly washed his face.

"Gerhard's here sir!" The gunner said as he slipped into the tank before closed the hatch. "Sorry, I'm late! Can't find my goddamn boots!"

"It's okay, at least you're here before the reds," the tank commander said. He peek his out from the hatch and looked around to see the infantries prepared themselves with rifles, rocket launchers, and AT gun.

They have lost number tanks already since the Red Army began the invasion. That's not the only problem. They also lack of supplies, mostly fuel which left some of their fighting vehicle unusable.

Not mentioning they also lost many men since the reds would kill everybody they saw. They got reinforcement rather quick, but unfortunately, most of them were just bunch of untrained militias called the Volkssturm and also some tanks, with rookie and inexperienced crews.

The young officer pitied those children and elders who were forced to fight. Even though he was in the Nazi Party military force, he felt anger to those high-ranking individuals, mostly Hitler. He began to ask about the prosperity the Führer of Germany always telling in his emotional propaganda speech, and why he must fight for a person like him. But nothing he can do, because if anyone tried to speak up, they would be 'silenced'. Emil had enough of his bullshits.

"Our recon plane have spotted the soviets, they are coming here!" Their leader Lieutenant Colonel Walther Emmerich said. "Everyone get into your positions!"

"Understood!" He said before told his driver. "Lauri, move up!" The driver nodded as he started the engine and moved the tank to behind the buildings near the town entrance to the east.

After waiting for some minutes, cloud of dusts appeared on the plain in front of the entrance. "They increased their speed to make dust so we can't see them? Clever enough…"

Then, lots of Katyusha rockets whistled down. "Rocket artillery! Take cover!" An officer shouted, telling everyone to duck to cover.

As the rockets hit the German's position, they exploded, decimating everything they hit. Fortunately, most of them missed the tanks.

"Open fire!" After the commander ordered, the German tanks began to open fire on the dusts.

"Do we hit them?" The Tiger I radio operator asked.

"Dunno," Heinrich replied as he entered another HE shell on the chamber. "Rounds ready!"

"Fire!"

The tank shook again from the gun's recoil. The young officer looked to the dusts as the tanks over there returned fire. _"Strange...they seemed to be stopping but those dusts didn't subside,"_ he thought as cold sweat rolled from his head. _"I have bad feeling about this."_

"This is...*static*...2! The soviet flanked us from the north!" The unit that covered the north road shouted in the radio as explosions and gunfires erupted in the background. "Requesting assistance!"

"What?!"

"Recon here, the smoke screen was only a distraction," the recon team said.

"You tell us this now?!" Walther replied irritatingly.

"I'm sorry sir, we just learned about this."

" _Scheisse!_ "

Seeing the situation wasn't siding on them, the officer spoke up. "Sir, permission to brought some armors and infantry to assist unit 2," he said as he stared on Walther's Konigstiger.

There was some pause before Walther gave his reply. "Permission granted," he stopped before continued. "Be careful, Emil..."

" _Jawohl_..." Emil replied in low tone before relaying orders.

"I need some volunteers to help unit 2; 5 Panzer IV, 3 StuG, 4 Panthers, 2 Sdkfz 251, 1 Jagdpanther, and a company of infantry with AT weapons."

After the said units volunteered themselves, Emil nodded. "Alright! Panzer move out!"

As he said, the newly created rag tag unit made their way to the north entrance.

Once they arrived on the north entrance, they saw several Panzer IVs making their last stands against a lot of T-34 and Infantries.

"Target T-34, 300 hundred meters, front! Use HEAT!" Emil told Gerhard.

"HEAT loaded!" Heinrich yelled after he replaced the shell.

" _Feuer!_ "

The 88 mm KwK 36 L/56 main gun of the Tiger fired the HEAT shell toward the Soviet tank. It hit its ammo rack, caused it to explode fiercely.

"Yeah! One down!" Gerhard laughed. "Keep it up, Heinrich!"

Erich noticed the other 3 T-34 fired on his tank's front armor, only to have all the shells ricocheted. They soon become the victim of the StuGs and Jagdpanther behind the Tiger. The fighting began shift toward the Soviet, until an IS-2 appeared.

"IS-2! 1 kilometer, north east!" Gerhard yelled frantically. The Soviet heavy tank destroyed one of the Panzer IV in one hit. _"Ficken Bolshevick Arschs!"_

"Lauri, reverse full!" As he told it, the Tiger reversed, missing the shell from the IS-2 just by inches.

"Return fire!" The German heavy tank once again shock as it fired upon the soviet tank and hit its front track, immobilizing it.

"Faster Heinrich!" Gerhard yelled as he zoomed in to the IS-2's fuel tank.

"I'm trying!" The loader quickly replied while loaded a HEAT shell. "Round's ready!"

"Fire!" The HEAT round rocketed to the fuel tank, causing fires to erupt inside the tank. Emil noticed some of the crews helplessly tried to escape from the hatch, only to be consumed by the flames.

"Yeah, target is history!" Gerhard cheered before noticed more T-34s coming. "Oh man, there are more of them!"

"Order, sir?" Lauri asked as he stared on the T-34s which began to move to flank them.

"Ferdinand, contact Emmerich's unit!"

"Sir?" The radio operator asked. Everyone looked to their commander.

"Do it!"

"Yes sir!"

"The other, keep firing!" He shouted his order. The Panzer IVs continued their intensive fire on the T-34s.

After receiving the reply, Ferdinand told his commander. "Kommandant, we had contacted them, the main unit is retreating to the west side of the town! The reds are trying to break the east entrance!"

"What?" Emil shocked. _"So they want to make us believe they attacked the north entrance, but in fact their main forces are in the east?!"_

Seeing that they have no other choice, Emil shouted his order. "All units! Pull back from here! We need to regroup with the main unit!"

" _Jawohl!_ " The tanks one by one began to disengage and pull back.

As they en-routed back to the west side, an IS-2 appeared from behind a house and pointed its gun on the Tiger's fuel tank. "Shit!" Emil cursed.

Fortunately, some Panzerfaust rockets found its way to the IS-2's ammo rack, causing it to explode like fire cracker.

"Over here!" A Waffen-SS soldier shouted from the window of a building. With him was several soldiers and Volkssturm militia.

Emil opened the hatch and looked to the group as they exited the building. Leading the men was a young man with _Pea Dot 44_ uniform and a _Sturmgewehr 44_ Assault Rifle in hand.

"Scharführer Ernst Hazelrink, at your service sir!" He said. "I had collected every remaining Volkssturm, along with the combat ready infantries and armors...at Oberstleutnant Emerich order! However, there are many more scattered-"

Emil cut his words. "Where is he? Where is the Oberstleutnant?" The NCO, Ernst just sighed heavily.

"He is holding the soviet back...His final order was, 'escape to the west and surrender to any closer Western unit'."

"What? Surrender? Are you serious?" The other German, a Wehrmacht soldier asked.

Another Waffen-SS sighed in defeat. "There's no way we can win this war anymore…"

"Traitor!" Everyone turned their attention to an SS officer who approached them. Several German soldiers shivered in fear. They are in trouble. "You are an SS! Don't you have shame on yourself?!

"Can't you see it with your eyes? The war had already lost! We are fighting a losing war!" An old Volkssturm militia shouted on the officer. Ernst quickly pushed him back.

"NO! Our Führer order us to defend the Fatherland till death! Those who disobeyed Führer's order will shoot!" The officer yelled stubbornly while pointing on the oldman. The oldman shoved Ernst away before shouting angrily.

"Hitler can eat shit!"

"What did you say?! How dare you!" The SS officer drew his Luger and shot the man on his stomach.

"Grandpa!" Another Volkssturm, a young child shouted as the oldman slumped to the ground.

Emil marched toward the officer. He quickly drew his Walther P38 and shot the SS on his head. It left the other stunned. The Tiger crews stared dumbfoundedly at their commander who had murdered his fellow officer. The silence continued until Ferdinand shouted.

"Sir, I heard a transmission from the radio!"

"Read it!" Emil told him.

"'This is Oberstleutnant Walther Emmerich to all members of Kampfgruppe Emmerich. Currently, I and the remains of the Heavy Panzer Battalion are holding back the Soviet armors. Use this opportunity to escape and surrender to any western Allied Force unit. That is my last order to all of you...I'm relieving the command to Hauptsturmführer Emil Edelweiss. It's an honor to serve with you...Carry on!' End of message..."

After the transmission ended, the tank commander gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. "Don't die Walther...You owe me a beer…"

"You heard him? Get all units ready to disengage from battle!" Ernst told the other. As most of his men left, he told Emil. "Don't worry sir, I got this!" The SS officer just nodded before the sergeant left.

Emil approached the wounded Volkssturm. His grandson gripped his hand tightly, tears dropped from his eyes.

He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it on the Oldman's wound. "Hold this! Keep the pressure on the wound," He told the young kid as he placed the kid's hand on the handkerchief.

The young officer recalled how he got that handkerchief. It was given by a beautiful blonde haired princess after he was beaten by a group of villagers for protecting his own sister. Ignoring her bloodied waist, she wiped the blood and dirts from his face. He still remembered her hurted but sweet smile that day. He wanted to return that handkerchief to her, but he kept forgetting that. And he was still keeping that until now. Guess, he won't be able to return it…

 _"_ _I'm sorry, Princess Finè,"_ Emil then looked to the other Volkssturm who was crouching beside him. "Hey get a medic!" He nodded and left to find a medic. Seeing his job is done, Emil returned to his tank.

"Thank you...sir!" The young kid yelled to him.

Emil stopped climbing his Tiger. "Don't mention it." He then slipped inside the tank and stood on his seat.

* * *

Meanwhile, Ernst was busy directing the other members to retrieve their weapons and evacuate the wounded. Sometimes, they returned the fires from the reds. Being the highest ranked NCO sure was hard.

"Sir! The Halftrack is full! We can't bring anymore wounded!"

"Tell the lightly wounded to ride on the tanks! Prioritize the heavily wounded!"

Suddenly, a T-70 light tank rolled in along with several squad of soviet infantries. The light tank fired its gun on one of the Sdfkz 251 Half-track, heavily damaging the vehicle and killing most of its occupants.

" _Scheisse!_ Give us a fucking chance, you _arschloch_!" A Wehrmacht grenadier shouted as he fired his MG42 on the soviet to suppress them. Another grenadier fired his Panzerschreck on the tank. The shaped-charge warhead hit the light tank's turret, rendering it useless and killed the crews inside it. The T-70 quickly retreated back.

Ernst quickly ran to another cover and opened fire with his _Sturmgewehr_. "Die _Bolsheviks!_ Die!" He shouted as he gunned down several soviet troops.

He ran to another cover inside an abandoned building where he saw a Hitlerjugend sitting on the floor. His back leaned on the wall and his hand still gripping his G43, despite they shook heavily. He had no helmet or field cap, revealing his completely messy blonde hair. His blue eyes blankly stared on the corridor in front of him. Shell-shocked, Ernst thought.

He then heard someone shout in Russian and not long after that, a Red Army soldier appeared from the corridor and kicked young kid on the chest. He grunted as he fell to the side. Ernst tried to shoot him but realized that his mag was empty. He released his helmet, revealing his neatly combed short red hair. "Eat this!" Before the soviet executed the Hitlerjugend, Ernst threw his helmet to him. He unsheathed his knife and charged on the soviet soldier, trying to stab him.

The soviet quickly reacted by catching his hand and pushed the sergeant to the wall. The soviet then choked his neck with his right arm while his left hand pinned Ernst's right hand which held the knife. "Это для Сталинграда!" The soviet shouted before added more pressure on the choke. Before he finished the German, a knife pierced his left chest from the back. "Arrgghhh!" He screamed. He looked to his back and saw the shell-shocked Hitlerjugend stabbed him.

Ernst used this opportunity to push him off and slit his throat. After the lifeless body was dropped into the floor, Ernst asked the Hitlerjugend who now breathing heavily.

"Are you okay?" He only nodded. "What's your name kid?"

"SS-Sturmmann...Ralph Von Feulner…" He replied quietly. Ernst nodded and tapped the young kid's shoulder.

"Okay Feulner, follow me! I'm bringing you out from here!" The young soldier nodded and followed Ernst to the convoy. A Wehrmacht soldier then approached them.

"Sir, all units had accounted for! Hauptsturmfuhrer Edelweiss told us to go ahead and retreat right now! He will cover our back!"

"Understood! Let's go!" Ernst nodded before ordering his men to move. Those who can still walk run on foot. It might hurt their legs but injured legs are much better than being captured by the Ivan.

* * *

"Sir! All infantry units had evacuated the city!" Ferdinand told his tank commander after receiving the message from the other units.

"Okay! Let's go!" After the Tiger decimated another T-34/76, it moved backward and retreated back along with the other remaining tanks. While on the run, Emil watched a lot of Stuka flying overhead. "Fred, get the Stuka on the radio! I want an air strike dropped into this city!"

Ferdinand nodded. He tried to contact them but it was avail. "Sir! I can't raise them!"

"Keep trying!"

Finally, he could raise them and asked for assistance, but his face was full of disappointment. "Sir, all air assets are engaging the Soviet Air Force! They are unable to cover us!"

"Fuck this!" He cursed as he hit the wall. He opened his palm and focused his power on it. However, nothing came out. _"Only if I can use my power here...Fuck!"_

"Look out!" Emil snapped out from his thought and looked to the sky. 40 of IL-2 ground attack aircrafts dived straight into the convoy. They unleashed torrents of high caliber 23mm rounds into the other lightly armored vehicles.

Watching the other vehicles getting shredded, the new _Kampfgruppe_ leader shouted on his headset. "Damn it! Get the Ostwind ready and shut them down!"

The Ostwind quickly returned fire. They managed to shut down most aircrafts, except for 18 who was still flying. Those aircrafts were now diving toward them. The Ostwind and the machine gunner in the other vehicle kept firing on them but they evaded every rounds they fired. The aircraft quickly closed their distance. The pilots fired their cannons into the German vehicles with no mercy. Emil bit his right hand until it bleed and spilled his blood into the road. Still, nothing happened. Even in crucial time like this he can do nothing.

 _"_ _I just want to save my men! I know I've never do anything good...I've failed to protect everything! I've gave my 3 years in this world to serve a madman! But please for this once, answer my prayer!"_ The Il-2s had dropped their bombs. Many of the German soldiers disembarked their vehicle and fled for their lives. The Ostwinds had stopped firing. The gunners knew it was hopeless. In this desperation, everyone had lost all hope, including the SS Captain who yelled in anguish to the sky. "I beg you, _Mein Gott_!"

The last time he saw was green light shining brightly, blinding his eyes and knocking him unconscious.

 _"_ _This is not the end...In fact this is the beginning of your tale, Schwarze Ritter…"_

* * *

 **Hello, KodokSangar here! Thanks for reading this piece of…Well, this is my very first Shuumatsu no Izetta fanfic after writing tons(not really) of Strike Witches fanfic(I will update them this month if I can). I've been thinking about writing this from months ago after I finished watching this anime. Why? I ain't nobody got time for that…**

 **I know some of you may call me a Nazi for featuring OCs who once part of Nazi Party's military force. Well, I don't support nor I promote Nazism and I have a reason on why the main protagonist is an SS. Is this going to OCxCanon fanfic? Well, you'll see…I do ship FinexIzetta though...**

 **I don't know if I'm going to add the Company of Heroes into the category since I think about that game since the beginning. Probably, I'm going to add it sooner or later.**

 **Well again, thanks for reading and RnR please!**

 **PS : I don't own the cover, but since it fit Emil's physical appearance, I stole it...LOL**


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